Knitting Dragonflies

I have not mentioned it, for fear of jinxing myself. But I have been on a yarn diet for a year now! yay! I can’t believe it. This was actually inspired by The Quilter , who is constantly making an amazing amount of quilts and knits! After serious stash busting, my yarn is down to a very small area, I even have empty plastic bins! I’m pretty proud of myself. I think I have enough for one more sweater, and about 4 skeins of bulky turquoise that I bought on sale, (for who knows what), otherwise it is random balls of prettiness. The diet was broken by the purple yarn I bought for my girlfriends hat. So it was immediately knitted up and sent out. Of course the diet didn’t include, cotton yarn for washcloths, but I immediately give these away as I knit them, so obviously doesn't count! Or any yarn that I bought to dye and sell. *giggle* Before I become too full of myself I will confess I was not on a fiber diet. So any space that I freed up, pretty much got filled with fiber. I’m ...

I’ve been on a big destashing mode lately. It makes me feel good. I can give, toss, or make something to give to someone. I have wanted to have a space in my office/craft room for meditation and yoga/Pilates.  Now I do! Almost done with it. Left on the list is new curtains, or some kind of window treatment. I was thinking about bamboo shades, until my neighbor’s son came over when I was piling baskets into my trash can. He said his mom wanted the one on my top shelf if I was going to get rid of it. I was so confused, until I realized that she could see that from her window across the street. (maybe with binoculars)! So blinds and or curtains. I’ve been doing quite a bit of spinning (for me). I met a girl on Ravelry that has become a good friend, she showed me how to core spin. While I still feel two thumbed when I’m trying this here is my first attempt: Spun up from a batt that I purchased from UniquelyYoursDesign.etsy.com   Fiber Content: Corriedale, Merino, B...

Do what you love, love what you do… I have an Etsy shop and have tried to sell several different items in it. Maybe it was the items, my lack of enthusiasm, the economy or another variable, it never really took off.   Quite by accident, I started dyeing my hand spun fiber. One night on Plurk I posted some of my fiber and a woman went wild over it, and insisted I could sell it. I was just having some fun though, and ignored her. Then another woman contacts me and wants me to make her some hand dyed yarn. so I do and sell it to her. After that I start getting all kinds of requests!! My knitting is on the back burner right now, and my husband is extremely tolerant, with dyeing and yarn all over the kitchen. Dinner? What you want to eat?   Moral to the story, life is short, thanks to all of the knitters and dyers online that have helped me on my way! Dream as if you'll live forever.  Live as if you'll die today.  ~ James Dean   Now I...

While trying to destash, I ran across some nice yarn, but the color way was outdated, or I was tired of them….So…..why not try overdyeing? (I know I’m really suppose to be destashing and decluttering my house, and I end up making a bigger mess) Over dyeing begins…why not…can it look worse? Yuck. Blue/yellow/red before.   Before and after, this is with 5 packages of grape Kool Aid, and microwave dyed . It took the harshness away. My husband doesn’t see much difference, but he IS a man. Here we are all dry and ready to go, now I would knit something with this yarn. Inspired by my success, I decided to try more yarn. I found this blue/orange/burgundy/green color way. ugh… More yarn…and this time I tried solar dyeing, I found out that WalMart had their sun tea jars (glass) on sale for $1 each. I used this method . This yarn reminds me of the 70’s, and then some grape and  cherry kool aid (sorry I know it’s generic, but that’s half the price) Sun tea jars...

Everyone who knits frogs, why do you? I tend to frog when I don’t think the yarn, needles or pattern are not working to my satisfaction. Not when I’ve made an error. I like to think I creatively incorporate my errors into my patterns. I like to let mistakes lie for a bit, let your knitting sit overnight, often in the middle of the night, or during a dog walk, I can come up with a improvisation to allow me to continue. If the error is not obvious to anyone but me, I often let it go. Can I make it into part of the pattern, add some design, or shaping? Or just outright ignoring it, especially if in an underarm or other inconspicuous area. I even found a dropped stitch once that I couldn’t ladder back up and tacked it down. I also take into account how far along I am, if not far, well I’ll rip it out, almost done. Start thinking creatively. Of course if you are going to “see” the mistake every time you look at your item. Definitely rip it out and fix the problem we must be at p...